The story is as old as time. A gorgeous, talented girl is discovered by a high-powered music executive. She then creates music the world loves and skyrockets into stardom. What’s different for Robyn Rihanna Fenty though is she did something that was totally unexpected for a pop star: became a billionaire from her business smarts, not her mega-hits, which she’d been churning out nearly for over fifteen years.

With rapt attention, we watched Rih’s creeping, but splendidly predictable, pivot. Signs of her evolution from singer to entrepreneur began showing themselves in 2017, the yr her cosmetics brand Fenty Beauty launched. The makeup brand was an fast hit, largely due to her cemented status as a wildly popular beauty and elegance heroine. But unlike most celebrity-powered business endeavors (particularly makeup brands), it wasn’t a flash within the pan. The corporate turned the sweetness industry on its head with a daring stance on inclusivity, offering 40 foundation shades without coaxing. It was a move no other brand attempted before, despite years of complaints from BIPOC customers who decried the shortage of representation in foundation color matches.

“She completely shook everyone by simply validating her consumers’ feelings,” said Dominic Madori-Davis, a senior reporter at TechCrunch who covers startups and enterprise capital. She says she’s been watching Rihanna’s rise for years, and its incomparable.

“Rihanna has mastered the art of connecting together with her audiences, whether it’s on stage, social media, or on store shelves,” Madori-Davis added.

Kourtney Ziegler, a tech entrepreneur, shared that a significant component of Rihanna’s success is steeped in her ability to tap into intersectional audiences and make them feel seen.

“She comes from a background of poverty and has needed to contend with racism, sexism, and other types of discrimination in all avenues of life and business,” Ziegler said, also stating that early adversity could have played a task in Rihanna’s intention to amplify underrepresented groups. That is evidenced by not only Fenty Beauty’s shade ranges, but in addition Savage X Fenty, Rihanna’s lingerie brand, an organization that frequently platforms diverse model talent that spans ethnicity, disability, sexuality, and age.

Madori-Davis points out that Rihanna’s business success is a signal of a significant shift within the entertainment industry, where artists have notoriously been commodified and left with little to no ownership of their work. Rihanna, unfortunately, learned that the hard way early on in her profession.

“Oftentimes, fans think music artists are wealthy coming into the industry and that’s just not the case.”

In 2007, she released “Umbrella,” her breakout hit, and by that point had reportedly amassed a net value near $50 million from album sales, touring and endorsements. But shockingly, just two years later she was nearly bankrupt. Business Insider reports her income had dwindled to $2 million in 2009 as a consequence of misappropriation from her accounting team.

“Together with women within the industry like Beyoncé, Rihanna has really applied that boss mentality across all points of her profession—she owns all her masters, which is actually rare, especially for a female artist,” Madori-Davis said, referring to the masterful move Rihanna reportedly made when she exited her old label in 2012, acquired the unique recordings to all of her songs. She then founded her own label imprint under RocNation. This allowed her to release music and receive a significant portion of the royalties.

Within the years following her last album, 2016’s Anti, Rihanna has been promising latest music but nothing has come. Aurielle Brooks, an Atlanta-based entertainment attorney, understands why—it’s not as lucrative of a business move as people might imagine.

“Oftentimes, fans think music artists are wealthy coming into the industry and that’s just not the case,” Brooks said, whose clients include Lil Baby, Muni Long and Lil Durk. “The music industry will be unpredictable. As an artist you possibly can release an album that’s premature, and it simply doesn’t do well. Artists must stay consistent of their efforts of not only making music but in addition touring, endorsement deals, partnerships and other ventures. Specializing in entrepreneurship will allow Rihanna to alleviate the unpredictable points of the music industry and have more control over her own innovation.”

“She is actually breaking the doors wide open for aspiring Black founders all over the place by showing them what’s possible all by being herself.”

George Acheampong, financial advisor and founding father of investment advisory firm Capitalwize identified that celebrities are sometimes boxed into certain spaces, which might work against them in business. Nevertheless, this public image challenge was advantageous to Rihanna’s growth as an entrepreneur, he says.

“A lot emphasis is placed on the art or talent of the artist as their fundamental asset, but Rihanna was capable of work out early on that her best asset was leveraging her brand power into securing equity ownership and partnership with considered one of the worlds most outstanding brands,” Acheampong said, alluding to her partnership with LVMH to launch her clothing brand. “Because of this, she was capable of achieve billionaire status by age 33, which is 16 years faster than Jay-z, whose label she satirically signed to at age 16. So arguably, he was capable of chart the trail for her to expedite her journey. Rihanna became an example of using artistry as a stepping stone to construct real ownership and wealth.”

And that wealth is very large.

Forbes reports that Rihanna is now value about $1.7 billion. An estimated $1.4B stems from Fenty Beauty, through which she owns 50%. One other portion comes from a Savage x Fenty stake, with the lingerie company topping out at an estimated $270 million. The remaining a part of the fortune is attributed to the years of her labor as a musician.

Madori-Davis identified that Rihanna’s ascent is very notable due to her unique positioning in business as a Black woman, a double minority that, even together with her celebrity status could’ve stunted entrepreneurial growth.

“As Black women, we’re doubted a lot, whilst a celeb,” she said. “Fenty Beauty reportedly only has one major investor, talking to the extent of trust she’s earned which is rare because often, we don’t get the good thing about the doubt from prospective LPs.” She’s right.

Black woman-led startups proceed to be severely underfunded depsite being the most important and fastest growing group of entrepreneurs within the US. Crunchbase reported that only 2.3% of world enterprise capital funding went to female founders in 2020. It’s even uglier for Black women, who got a mere 0.35% of all VC funding that yr.

Madori-Davis added, “She is actually breaking the doors wide open for aspiring Black founders all over the place by showing them what’s possible all by being herself.”